


Senior Tag

by orphan_account



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Gen, High School, Post-Sburb/Sgrub, Senior tag
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-04-30
Updated: 2012-05-08
Packaged: 2017-11-04 13:56:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,464
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/394623
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Senior tag is serious business. Jade Harley really wants to win this year.<br/>Eridan doesn't want to do anything anymore. But Jade heard he had really good aim...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. high school never ends

He was sitting under a tree (upperclassmen had the privilege of eating lunch outside), reading his English assignment, cursing Beowulf and fuckin language evolution all the while. He hated English class. He didn't even know why he was putting effort into this, he really didn't care. Not even the battles of the poem were in any way decent. Dull, like everything was. But he floated through his class, doing the bare minimum to not fail.

He was floating through all of his schooling, honestly. He had sent in  his college applications as was expected, applied for a few scholarships and was set. He didn't really want to go to college; he didn't want to out the effort in to it, but he figured that leaving the entire SGrub/SBurb survivors and slipping into obscurity might make his life a bit better. He was a bit relieved that senior year was almost over. His year hadn't been the best of his life, or whatever the fuck they told the class in that first week. It wasn't the worst time, that honor went to the time spent on that floating rock in space, but it wasn't enjoyable by any means. Either way, it was now April and that much closer to graduation. The prom committee was getting all their plans underway and the school started advertising the fuck out of graduation invitations and shit. He assumed that would get worse as the months dragged on. Also, he heard some whispering about a game called Senior Tag around the halls. He understood the basic concept of the game. He hadn't been approached about joining a team, which is just as well because he hadn't approached anyone either. The only people close enough to him to ask probably didn't want him around anything that could shoot someone, whether it was just water or not. And maybe he didn't want to hold something like a gun ever again.

He put the book down and picked at his sandwich. He didn't really like cheese all that much and that was the only thing in the house. And the fuckin turkey was dry.

Stupid.

He stood up and threw away his trash. He adjusted his scarf so it stopped rubbing against his neck gills, pushing the fabric in place with long fingers. He didn't wear that many rings anymore; only his class ring which had been practically forced on him, a medium gold band and one purple stone with his jagged insignia etched on it with silver paint, as a kind of security blanket. Wearing anything else just felt... wrong. Like it was pulling back memories that should have been left untouched.

He couldn't wait until school was over and he could run away to some university on the other side of the country and never see any of them again. He had gotten looks, those I can't believe you looks when he applied to only schools far away, but he brushed them off with a blank look back and a retreat to the room given to him.

The bell rang for the next period. He hadn't even realized that so much time had passed. He hoisted his book bag, a gray messenger thing that was still in decent condition, at least decent enough, and made his way to class.

When he got home, he would have to sleep or something cause he kinda felt like his brain was full of cotton. And that was fucking stupid.

\----------

Jade Harley was on a mission. She had already gotten Tavros to join her senior tag team, as well as actually pulling Dave away from whatever ironic crusade he was on to participate. She had a huge fight with John over who would get Dave but she finally won with a well placed finger-jab to his side and a mad dash to Dave's door. Now she was looking for a fourth member to complete her team.

Jake had told her to get someone with good aim in their Skype chat last night. He had graduated a few years prior and his team was the terror of the school. Then again, it was him, Dirk, Roxy, and Jane. Unfortunately for Jade, John wanted to form his own team for reasons (probably to force Karkat to participate in his schooling) and Rose flat out refused to play. So her options were limited. She had jumped Tavros in Physics one day before Vriska could try anything.

Now she was walking with him after class. They had a lab that day and Tavros was her lab partner this semester.

"Tavros, who do you know any really good shots for the team?"

Even though Tavros was still painfully shy most of the time, or maybe because of it, he was popular in the school. He was kind and sweet and easy to talk to. Jade figured he would know someone to join the team.

He flushed brown, blushing flower-like over the bridge of his nose and cheekbones. Yet another reason why people loved him; his blush was absolutely adorable. "Well, uh, there is one. But I don't think that you, uh, really like him."

Jade grabbed his arm. "Tell me! This is of the utmost importance!"

"I..."

She gave him the best puppy-dog look she could manage. Even in this new universe she had some leftovers from reaching god tier; a sensitive nose, great hearing, good sense of direction and awareness of where she was, and fabulous puppy-dog eyes.

Tavros never stood a chance. He fell apart like putty in her hands.

"It's Eridan. I know that he, uh, used to have that rifle."

Jade nodded. She vaguely remembered getting trolled by a caligulasAquarium and throwing away the code he gave her.

"But he doesn't really do anything anym-"

Jade put a hand to his mouth. He looked at it, going crosseyed.

"Shh. Where is his locker?"

Tavros told her and gave another caution that he might not respond well.

"I wasn't really, uh, friendly with him, but I heard what he, um, did and, just be careful Jade."

She screwed her face into a look of concentration. "Well, he hasn't done anything here. Anything at all. And if he was as good with a gun as you say then we _need_ him on our team to beat whatever John has planned," she said, patting his arm consolingly. "Besides, I can take care of myself."

**************************************************************************************************************************************************

She went to wait for him by the door of his last period class, leaning on the doorframe as nonchalantly as she could. He was one of the last people to leave, slipping through at the end of the mass exodus of students, still pulling his back over his shoulder. She pushed herself in front of a short girl, quickly apologized and grabbed the first part of him she could.

"C'mere," Jade said, pulling him by his sleeve to a window in the hallway.

"What do you want?" His voice sounded like it had been scrubbed with steel wool. Not quite like she knew laryngitis sounded, more like it was tired and scratchy.

She smiled at him, lips stretched wide so her buck teeth looked more prominent than normal. "So I hear you're a good shot?"

"Who told you that?"

She shrugged. "Doesn't matter. What matters is that my senior tag team only has three people and you aren't on one, right?"

He didn't say anything, instead tugging at his scarf. Jade tried to gauge his body language; he juts looked uncomfortable, tense, pulled into himself. She sighed on the inside. This was going to take some work.

"So you'll do it? That's great. Let's get you signed up, then you can come over and help make plans."

"I never said-" He was cut off by her dragging him away again.

He jerked his hand away. "Leave me alone," he hissed at her. She looked straight into his eyes, hoping that eye contact would make him relax. He flickered his eyes away from hers but she just tilted her head to make contact again. He didn't evade this time, instead just staring at her. His irises were nearly full of violet pigment, rich color against his pupils. But still they were dull and lifeless. Empty, so empty. She didn't like it.

"Just leave me alone," he repeated the mantra and slouched down the hallway away from where she was standing.

What had even happened to him?

Ah well, more reason to make him join her team. She gathered herself and set down the hall to where her car was parked. She'd have to message him to tonight, or someone who could get him for her. She hummed a big band song to herself and smiled. Yeah, that's what she'd do.


	2. and even when your hope is gone

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THIS CHAPTER CONTAINS SUICIDAL THOUGHTS  
> (I hope I didn't fuck it up oh god) (also screw HTML)

That night when he got home he didn't just curl up and sleep. Instead, he went to the bathroom and curled up there, wrapping his arms around his middle as if to hold himself together.  
  
What gave her any right, any right at all to force him to take a gun up again or even talk to him when he was trying to slip away and not talk to anyone ever again. A small throbbing was building up in his torso, focused on the area underneath his ribs and above his hipbones, right in the soft flesh of his gut. Where Kanaya had sliced him in half. Sometimes he would feel phantom pangs from the thin line around his middle and he wondered if anyone else had them too. If Feferi ever had a sudden shooting pain in her expanding and collapsing aquatic based circulatory system from where he shot her. That thought made him sick; the thought of her hurting was worse than any pain he now felt.  
  
He was so tired on top of the hurt and the floor looked like a perfect place to sleep, horrorterrors be damned. His eyes slid closed as he pressed his face on the cold tile.  
       -  
He dreamed of killing Feferi, Kanaya, destroying the matriorb. He couldn't stop himself even though he was trying, trying so hard. He was screaming at them to run, at Sollux to get up and stop him, but he kept shooting and despite his internal screams he swore he laughed, actually laughed at the tyrian and jade flood that pooled at his feet, sticking to his shoes so they left bloody footprints as he left the bodies still cooling on the ground.  
  
He could taste the blood in the air, his own bubbling in his throat and tyrian, jade, and mustard around him. He felt cold from his fingers to the deepness of his veins, his blood icy slush running through him. He stalked away and saw the others in the distance when he saw something bright in the corner of his eye, stalking toward him (this isn't how it happened, wake up, wake up), and he turned around in time to see Kanaya swing at him, then blinding pain and a feeling of separation, of being light and empty, all while being ambushed by stinging air on ragged edges of skin. He fell to the ground, but the pain of smacking his head on the ground was nothing to the agony in his torso. He felt dizzy and all he could see was Feferi falling with wide, tear-filled eyes, and he was going to die again, all over again.  
  
He jerked himself awake and vomited into the toilet. Cod, he felt sick to his stomach. His blood-pusher was fluttering at a million miles per hour, the ache in his chest was nearly unbearable and he swore the line around his center was going to split open again.  
  
Fuck.  
  
He waited for leftover nausea to pass before hauling himself to his room. It was purple, purple everywhere and filled with many of the things that had been in his old hive on Alternia. He didn't find himself using that much of it but the fact that it was there was oddly comforting. A callback to a time before everything went to shit and he hurt everyday and felt like sleeping all the time. Before he realized that he was actually worthless and a complete jerk and why didn't someone cull him before.  
  
He didn't even have the decency to try and cull himself. He was too cowardly to die, to face death again. He had thought about it in the past, sure, but there was just something about having to die again that scared him. He didn't think there were dream bubbles anymore, so he wouldn't be tormented there, and if he were to die it would be just like being knocked out, painless and quick. But he was scared of the unknown and maybe in his deepest self he didn't think he was worthy of the blank nothing death would grant him. He was contemptible, the worst kind of troll, of sentient being. He didn't blame anyone for not talking to him; he wouldn't talk to himself if he had the choice either. Maybe he should just go die now.  
  
He went to his desk and pushed away the keyboard while grabbing a pen from the corner case. A flat purple notebook sat already on the desk from that morning when he'd almost played hooky. He opened it and started to write. He thought he'd read somewhere that writing out your feelings would make you feel better. It rarely did or have the same effect that talking with Feferi or Kanaya or even Karkat ever did, but he knew that they never wanted to hear from him again or listen to his bullshit, so he would just talk to the paper in his notebook.  
  


i just feel tired all the time but i know that when i run away it wwill be better. they wwont have to deal with me and i can just float awway.  
i mean, wwhat is wwrong with me? actually wwhat isnt wwrong with me. im an asshole and it took me killin the only girl ive evver been flushed for to realize it.  
i can nevver apologize for wwhat i did an i knoww that. i just wwish i could forget, but i don't deservve that.  
i used to wwant to die in my sleep so i wouldnt have to do it myself. but ive got a plan noww. im goin to run awway.  
  


He chewed his lip and thought about what to write next. He could treat this as an actual journal for once, but he didn't even have the impetus to do so.  
  
He looked at his computer, dust collecting a film on the top. He needed to type something for class, but that just seemed like too much work. He vaguely wondered if he could get away with not doing it. Eh, he wasn't going to anyway. He felt like shit all of a sudden, which was stupid since he had actually been feeling rather good for the past week. As good as he could anymore, he guessed.  
  
Eridan pulled his laptop off the cord and took it to the bed in the corner of the room, sliding under the purple comforter and holding the computer next to him. Maybe he should get online, check out some sites, or something like that. Maybe it would fill the hollowness that the stupid dream always left him with. He pushed the top of the computer up and pressed the power button.  
  
When the laptop had been given to him, it had come with Pesterchum already installed and ready to open at power-on of the computer. However, he didn't get online much, which was fine since even when he was online no one messaged him. Which was just as well, he understood. They didn't want to get dragged into his bullshit again.  
  
His chum list was about the same as his Trollian list. It came that way and he didn't even think to question it. Most of the names were highlighted as online (with the exception of Rose, as he knew she was downstairs and strangely enough, John and Karkat). He ignored the list as usual, they wouldn't answer him anyway, (he had tried a bit in the first week or so of being in the new universe), and opened up Google Chrome. He went to Spark Notes to read the entries on symbolism in Beowulf and opened up a Word document. Maybe he would do his homework, but he hurt all over and kinda just wanted to sleep, even though he was scared of having that dream again.  
  
His computer made a familiar ting of a new chat box being opened.  
  
       --gardenGnostic [GG] began pestering caligulasAquarium[CA] 

GG: hey eridan!!!

GG: i know youre online you cant hide from me.  
GG: have you thought about joining my team?  
CA: wwhat are you goin on about  
GG: oh good, you answered  
GG: :)  
  
  
Eridan didn't even know what to say. His fingers rested over the keyboard like a ship in foreign waters, unsure of how to proceed. It had been so long since he could just type all of his thoughts into the chat bar and press enter. Besides, it was that behavior that got him in trouble in the first place.  
  
GG: so i heard that you were good at strategy 

GG: oh, im going to add you to the team at school tomorrow, thats okay right? 

CA: sure 

CA: wwhatevver 

GG: yay! i need your email too 

GG: mine is jharleypumpkingardener@gmail.com 

CA: eriampora@gmailcom 

GG: okay! we are meeting after school come join us 

CA: sure 

GG: wow, this is going easier than i thought it would be 

GG: you dont have anything to say other than sure? 

CA: not really 

CA: im tired

CA: and it hurts 

GG: what hurts? 

CA: nothin 

CA: nevvermind 

GG: no if youre hurting then tell someone 

CA: it doesnt matter 

CA: it wwill go awway in a bit 

CA: its already almost gone noww 

GG: whats almost gone? 

CA: i told you nothin 

GG: you cant just say stuff like that and not expect me to worry 

CA: wwhy not no one evver cared before anywway 

GG: ... are you alright? 

CA: im fine 

GG: okay... GG: i dont really believe you but 

CA: dont wworry about any a it

CA: no one has before 

GG: just promise youll be at the meeting tomorrow. 

CA: wwhere is it 

GG: the library study area to start 

GG: we might move later 

CA: ill be there 

GG: okay and if you arent ill find you  

 gardenGnostic [GG] stopped pestering caligulasAquarium [CA]

He stared at the screen. What even just happened. She just looked right through him, through their Internet connection, and he almost wanted to just tell her everything. Someone was listening to him, he could just tell all about the hurt, the worthlessness, the listlessness, the everything. Cod, what was going to happen to him.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm trying super hard to get clinical depression nailed. So tell me if I fucked it up huge, cause I have no real idea what I'm doing.
> 
> Also, don't expect another update this fast. (I'm hiding from other multichaptered fic I have... which I'm working on the third chapter... for like three months cause I suck)  
> Next chapter returns to Jade, so less depressing angst time and more silly school world building.


	3. i'm the one who will help you stand

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> FUCK HTML I GIVE UP.  
>  **HEY I TRIED TO FIX IT LET'S SEE HOW THIS WORKS**

Jade spent that night spying on John. So far she had who his team was (Himself, Vriska, Karkat and Terezi) and a basic idea of what his strategy was (pranking, how original. But Vriska did offer them an advantage), and she was putting together some basic plans. She clicked her pen on her desk, impatient. The class had to be done soon, then her team meeting could commence. Feferi leaned across her desk and mouthed "hey, are you okay? you seem out of it", to which Jade mouthed back, "yeah. just thinking about senior tag," accompanied with a small gun-shooting gesture. Feferi stifled a giggle with her hand and nodded. Feferi had joined a team with Aradia and two girls from Aradia and Feferi's physics class. Jade and Feferi called a relative alliance between their teams until further notice.

 

Feferi mouthed at Jade again. "You find a fourth member yet?" she said, gesturing as well, keeping her hands under her desk.

  
Jade nodded. She knew Feferi knew Eridan and that they had some kind of history. But for the longest time, Feferi would get all dodgy when he was brought up and then she finally told Jade at a sleepover about how they used to be moirails and she had gotten tired of dealing with his emotional baggage and how he had said he was flushed for her and showed Jade the scar where he shot her, which she usually passed as an operation scar from when she was young. But they had actually talked about him some and how she didn't know what to think of him anymore. It had been a long time and no one saw him anymore and Vriska tried to tell them that he had tried to run away, like a coward, and that's why he didn't show up at school so much. Jade got out a piece of paper and started writing out a message telling her who she had brought on to her team. She folded it up and shot it over to Feferi, who picked it up and read it quickly. Expert note-passing; they were the best at it. They never got caught, ever.  
  
Feferi scribbled out a response and flipped the paper back to Jade. Jade opened it and smoothed it out, getting a pen ready for a response.  
  
you got -Eridan? reely?  
  
Jade wrote her response as quickly as she could.  
  
yeah. are you mad?  
  
Feferi's response came fast.

  
w)(y would i be mad? t)( is is a GAM--E, and we've glubbed aboat --Eridan anyway. i'm just surfprised he said yes.

  
yeah. i pestered him last night and he only gave me one or two word answers. and something about no one caring what happened to him. do you think what vriska said about him is right?  
  
maybe. but wouldn't somebody have said somefin if )(e was depressed and suicidal?  
  
i hope. but if he hid it then what can we do?

  
She looked upset and drew a little sad face on the paper in purple pen. Jade held the note and looked over at her, catching Feferi's eye. She pursed her lips then pointed toward the teacher, who was getting ready to pass out a worksheet of some kind. They had to pay some sort of attention, as Mrs. Ferris was dead-set in combating Senioritis by making them do huge packets for a stupid amount of points, enough to fail someone so they would have to take summer school or maybe not graduate.  
  
Jade looked intently at Mrs. Ferris, a skill she perfected in the beginning of the year, so the teacher wouldn't call her out as not paying attention, which she didn't sometimes, it wasn't her fault, the class was just so boring sometimes. And today her head was swimming with ideas. What do to for her team, the fact that graduation was coming up so soon, her talk last night with Eridan. She sincerely hoped to see him upbeat today at the meeting. Maybe that would make her feel better.  
  
\-----  
The school library had a study area in the back corner, a secluded spot with a couple tables, chairs, and electrical outlets. Jade made use of the study corner a lot over the years. She knew how to work the area so it was more private, when the heaviest traffic was. It was the perfect spot to have a team meaning.  
  
She walked with Feferi to the library and over to the study area, talking the whole time about silly things. Feferi peered into the corner, looking for Eridan, and not finding him her tenseness melted away. For all Feferi talked about how she didn't care what he did, Jade thought Feferi had more baggage over what happened than she wanted to admit.  
  
"You don't have to stay if you're uncomfortable, you know," Jade said, turning to Feferi. Feferi made a chirpy noise from the back of her throat.  
  
"I'm clampletely fin!"  
  
Jade shook her head and pushed Feferi away, spinning her around and directing her toward the door. "You are not fine. Don't worry, I'll deal with this myself. I'll see you later, okay!" Jade smiled and waved Feferi away.  
  
Tavros was the first to come to the study area after Jade herself; he ducked into the corner and sat down in a chair opposite Jade. He waved in greeting and opened up his English notebook. Tavros was extremely diligent about his homework, even at the end of the year. Jade leaned over and looked over his work, curious. She helped him out a lot, especially with the issues in English most trolls had. He didn't really want to go to Rose's study sessions, no matter how flawless her rhetoric.  
  
The question was whether Dave or Eridan would show up next. Dave was almost always late in some ironic statement incomprehensible to everyone but him and she had no idea if Eridan would even remember to come, despite what he might have said last night. He just seemed so out of it, to be honest.  
  
Eridan slouched into the library after a few minutes. He looked around franticly then walked over to their table. He slid into the first seat he reached, next to Jade and put his bag on his lap. He didn't look at Jade and Tavros, his eyes directed to the center of the table, staring vaguely into space.  
  
"Well, we could wait for Dave to get here, but he's probably going to be late. So we can get started. The bracket should be out tomorrow, so we will know which team we are against this round," Jade introduced, trying to break the tension in the room.  
  
"Why are we here then? What are we even doing?" Eridan blurted out, then shrunk back into his seat, his bag still a shield across him.  
  
Tavros shifted. "Um, maybe we can just talk? Because we don't, uh, know what we are doing." An unspoken word hung in the air. And we don't know you anymore. Eridan collapsed even further. How was Tavros of all people making him react like this. Jade wanted to fix it, stick a pole up his shirt so he had to stand tall and look at the world around him. She intervened before any more weird troll things could happen.  
  
"I was thinking we could go get ice-cream once Dave gets here. It's a nice day, and Jenny's is right down the street," she said, smiling. Tavros smiled back. Jenny's was a normal place to go after school and a lot of the game survivors made it their hang-out (along with other students, but it was different for them). It was at that store that Terezi and Dave officially hooked up, where Karkat delivered the now infamous Ke$ha is the Worst Fucking Thing Ever speech and Dave then spent the next month trailing the troll, playing Blah Blah Blah on full volume behind him. It's actually surprising no one got seriously injured in that fiasco, especially when Gamzee got involved. Aradia got a summer job there and that just made everyone hang there more. Now that she thought about it, it did seem strange that Eridan was the only troll not there. Hell, even Vriska was there, and she was arguably worse than Eridan.  
  
Tavros looked happy at that. Now Dave just needed to move his ass here.  
  
And Dave did not show up for at least 5 more minutes. He entered with a carefree stride and stood against a column next to the table.  
  
"Sup." He titled his chin toward the table group. Jade and Tavros waved back, but Eridan just stared back. Dave looked straight at the seatroll through his shades and lifted his pale eyebrows so they disappeared under his bangs. "You got Gills here? Good job Harley. I didn't think you had it in you."  
  
Jade scowled at Dave. "You were supposed to be here ages ago! What took you so long?" Jade stopped and decided to interrupt his long-winded speech as soon as he opened his mouth, "you know what, it doesn't matter. Just be on time in the future."  
  
Dave shrugged. The tension from before was melting away with Dave's emergence into the study corner. Jade felt herself relax and she saw Tavros calm down (she knew lots of troll body language now from the minute twitches of their eyes to flat out growling), and let herself sneak a peek at Eridan. He was tenser than before, if that was possible. Maybe this wasn't such a good idea. What if he lashed out again?  
  
"Weren't we going to go to, uh, Jenny's? Was that the plan?" Tavros said, breaking into whatever thoughts Jade was having. She turned away from Eridan and nodded.  
  
"Yeah. Let's go."  
  
She grabbed Eridan's hand and pulled him along out the door and out the school. Tavros and Dave followed, of course, but Jade was more focused on Eridan next to her than the two boys who she knew would be okay for now. Eridan she wasn't sure about. His hand was corded tightly under hers, his fingers gnarled against her skin. He was cold, so cold but she thought that maybe her blood ran warmer as she held him. She didn't even really want to let go of his hand to drive her car. Dave sat shotgun, no one ever fought him there, that was his spot, and Tavros and Eridan rode in the back and she eyed Eridan out of her rearview mirror, although she did keep her eyes on the road mostly, she was a good driver, honestly!  
  
It only took a minute to get to Jenny's, and they could have walked there, but Jade would drive people home immediately after and going back to the school after that would be stupid. They entered the shop with a little ring of the bell on the door, Jade pulling Eridan again, because she wanted to touch him and she didn't even know why but it was a good feeling nonetheless. The ice cream store was obscenely air conditioned and she smiled in the burst of cold air in her face. She tugged Eridan toward the line to order but he was rigid and unmoving. Jade looked back and traced his fear-struck eyes over to a booth where Kanaya sat with Rose over thick AP packets for English, pen in hand ready to annotate the hell out of it. Wait, she was the one who stopped him in the Veil, wasn't she? And by stop, Jade heard it was actually a chainsaw to the torso.  
  
"Hey, are you okay?" Jade pulled him closer to her, but he still stared at Kanaya with pure shock and even horror. He shook his head.  
  
"No, I can't. Let me go," he muttered and tried to take a step back. His fins were pinned back against his neck, maybe to make himself seem smaller, less threatening. Jade was scared. He was having a panic attack right in front of her and she didn't know what to do. She dragged him to a booth opposite from the source of the problem (but Kanaya isn't necessarily a problem, just right now to Eridan). She sat him down and looked straight at him.  
  
"Shh, breathe," she whispered. He still looked upset and she thought that maybe she should just let him go. But she was going to make him eat some ice cream and hang out with people anyway. "You stay here, I'm gonna order your cone. Is there any flavor you want or do you like chocolate?"  
  
He stared at her, which she decided to take as a yes, and she flounced up to order. Dave gave her a look as she returned from calming Eridan and ordered his own. Jade rolled her eyes. Whatever, no one had any right to get mad at you for helping someone out, especially someone who was so messed up. She ordered her and Eridan's ice cream with maybe a bit more gusto than strictly necessary, black cherry for herself and chocolate for him, and made her way back to the seat. Tavros followed behind shortly, licking his Oreo cone and Dave went to Kanaya and Rose to bug them about something. Jade handed over the cone to Eridan; when their fingers brushed, Jade swore that he was an ice sculpture, not alive, but he withdrew his hand quickly and took the ice cream to his mouth. Jade watched as he took a bite of it and gave her the smallest of smiles.  
  
"Thank you, Harley." His voice was imperceptible, feather-light but still it was good to hear him. The floatiness of his voice made her feel floaty. Helping people was amazing.  
  
She couldn't wait to help him more.

**Author's Note:**

> WHY AM I STARTING A NEW MULTICHAPTER FIC  
> I AM A STUPID HEAD.  
> But the next chapter is pretty much written, I just need to finish out the scene.


End file.
